The weather does funny things. I’m well aware of it, having lived in the South my entire life. There’s a phenomenon known as the fifth season here, though I’m probably the only person who uses that term. That’s the crazy time of year where the weather can’t make up its mind what it wants to be. If the weather goes back up to eighty degrees again in a week or so, then we’ll be in the fifth season. If not, then fall may have actually begun on a reasonable timetable this year, which is shocking and possibly a first. See, the weekend before last I was wearing a t-shirt and was comfortable, even slightly hot, when going out and about. Last week the weather took a crazy turn and suddenly dipped about twenty degrees. If you’re like me and prefer the warm, then you may have needed long sleeves to go out. In fact, I really should have worn long sleeves today to go out but didn’t think about it. It didn’t kill me.
So why do I like northern life over southern life? One word: snow. The snow makes all the cold weather worth it because there’s actually cold hard evidence of cold weather. In the South, snow rarely happens, so we suffer through the cold with nothing to show. What fun is that?
In case you’re wondering, the ten-day forecast, mathematically unreliable though it may be, says it’s to warm up toward the rest of this week. Those things can’t be trusted thanks to the unpredicatability of weather, but if it does warm up in that span, then I’m calling fifth season shenanigans.